Is the Chelsea dream already over for Romelu Lukaku?

Romelu Lukaku announced his arrival at Chelsea with a bang. The Belgian scored in his first Premier League game of the season and gave an overall dominant display. He seemed to be the key to Chelsea’s problems, as he was everything that the Blues were missing. Strong, determined and clinical in nature, there was nothing stopping Lukaku from achieving Premier League greatness at Stamford Bridge. He scored two more goals against Aston Villa in the first half of the season. However, after that, there was an eerie silence in front of the goal. Not only were the Blues making very few chances, but the chances that Lukaku did get, he was missing.

It was evident that Lukaku was not comfortable playing the formation that Thomas Tuchel had set up. The formation left Lukaku with very little room for mobility and the big Belgian was almost always the target man. The opposition understood this very quickly. As soon as Lukaku would receive the ball, two or three defenders would close him down and even track his movements off the ball. It was becoming increasingly frustrating for the former Inter Milan man and he went eight PL games without scoring.

Things only got tougher for the player when he got injured in the game against Malmo and was forced out for a long time. He came back without providing much impact and was then diagnosed with COVID-19. Things were looking down for him until he managed to score two goals on his return, one against Aston Villa and one against Brighton. Both of them were typical striker’s goals and it was good to see the No. 9 returning to his former self. However, then things got messed up again, this time due to a candid interview with Sky Sports where Lukaku described his unhappiness at Chelsea.

Could Chelsea and Romelu Lukaku part ways in the near future?

The striker claimed that he was not playing in the formation that Tuchel had promised him at the beginning of the season and that this was hampering his performance. The manager retaliated by dropping the big man from the squad entirely in the game against Liverpool. This was a season-defining game and Lukaku seemed to have found his form again. Thus, this was a huge statement made by the German coach. After the match, Tuchel seemed to be in a good mood and confirmed that Lukaku was still a Chelsea player and that he would have a talk with the player on Monday.

That seemed to be the end of the story until it was discovered that Lukaku’s Facebook bio read ‘Inter Milan’ instead of Chelsea. This was obviously done by the admin of his page or it hasn’t been touched since the summer. However, it begs us to ask, what is exactly going on? Did Lukaku upset the whole squad? Is the player upset by the manager trying to silence him? At this point in time, there are too many questions and no answers. All we know for sure is that the situation is quite heated and an exit for the star man wouldn’t be too surprising.

Players and managers have fallen out for lesser reasons and Lukaku publicly bashing Tuchel’s tactics may have damaged their relationship beyond repair. Neither of them is right, while Lukaku could have been more subtle about his approach, the manager should also not try to silence one of his players. The whole situation is quite messy at the moment and if Lukaku is left out of any other big games, we could see the player leave at the end of the season.

Do you think Lukaku’s time in London is over? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter!